12 October 2017, Ottawa — Hundreds of public service workers are holding a rally at 12:30 pm today in front of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s office to send a clear message to the Liberal government: Enough is enough!

The Liberal government had set itself a deadline of October 31, 2016, to resolve the bulk of pay cases and now, a year later, the Phoenix pay system is still struggling. It’s time to fix Phoenix once and for all and pay damages to the thousands of public service workers who have struggled with the consequences of erratic and insufficient pay and, in many cases, no pay.

The ill-conceived and premature launch of the Phoenix pay system has resulted in severe consequences, despite the estimated $750 million spent so far:

• nearly half of public service employees have had problems with pay, leading to a variety of stressful scenarios for workers and their families
• there have been 11 government-wide breaches of personal information due to Phoenix
• the number of new problematic pay cases continue to grow

“This has gone on long enough,” said Greg McGillis, Regional Executive Vice-President for the Public Service Alliance of Canada in the National Capital Region. “We call on the government to ensure public service workers receive payments for damages due to this unbelievable fiasco.”

“Fixing Phoenix means ending government’s appalling record of over-reliance on IBM and other outsourced services,” said Debi Daviau, President of the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada. “Parliamentary Secretary Steven MacKinnon said last week that the government would fix this problem to everyone’s satisfaction using public employees. We plan to hold him to that promise.”

Media Contacts:

Alroy Fonseca                                                                       

Regional Political Communications Officer              

PSAC National Capital Region                                  

613-262-3658 | fonseca@psac-afpc.com

Johanne Fillion

Press Officer

PIPSC

613-883-4900 | jfillion@pipsc.ca

11 October 2017, Ottawa — Public service workers will be holding a rally in front of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s office on October 12 to tell the Liberal government that: Enough is enough! Fix Phoenix now and pay damages to workers!

When: 12 October 2017 at 12:30pm

Where: Corner of Wellington and Elgin

What:

• Rally to protest Phoenix pay system.
• Photo ops:
  • crowds with placards.
• Interview ops:
  • Greg McGillis, Regional Executive Vice President for the National Capital Region, Public Service Alliance of Canada
  • Debi Daviau, President, The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada
  • Sean McKenny, President, Ottawa & District Labour Council

Media Contacts:

Alroy Fonseca
Regional Political Communications Officer
PSAC National Capital Region
613-262-3658 | fonseca@psac-afpc.com

Johanne Fillion
Press Officer
PIPSC
613-883-4900 | jfillion@pipsc.ca

Ottawa, September 27, 2017 – The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada (PIPSC), which represents approximately 15,000 federal scientists, engineers and researchers, welcomes the announcement of Dr. Mona Nemer as Chief Science Advisor.

“We hope the appointment of Dr. Nemer will ensure federal scientists at last have a true champion for more federal science funding and a strong opponent of muzzling,” said PIPSC President Debi Daviau. “We look forward to the opportunity of working closely with Dr. Nemer.”

Under the previous Harper government, federal science-based departments and agencies faced severe funding cuts and many scientists were muzzled. PIPSC fought hard against both, eventually winning contract language earlier this year that specifically recognizes the right of scientists to speak freely about science and their research.

“Reinvesting in federal science also remains a priority for our members,” added Daviau. “Dr. Nemer’s early comments that she supports more funding for science will be viewed as a hopeful sign by many federal scientists. Canada not only needs more science, it needs more scientists.”

The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada represents some 55,000 professionals across Canada’s federal and provincial public sectors.

Follow us on Facebook and on Twitter (@pipsc_ipfpc).

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For further information:

Johanne Fillion
613-228-6310, ext 4953 or 613-883-4900 (cell)
jfillion@pipsc.ca

For Immediate Release

Labour Day 2017: Labouring to Fix Phoenix

Ottawa, September 1, 2017 – Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada (PIPSC) members attending this year's Labour Day parade* in downtown Ottawa will be encouraging the public and the labour movement to show their solidarity for public servants hurt by the Phoenix pay roll system. PIPSC’s float – a modified bus – will encourage the Labour Day crowd to "Get on board with fixing Phoenix," which has plagued public servants since it was rolled out in early 2016.

“Late pay, no pay, wrong pay. Our members are understandably in a less than festive mood. One in two federal employees is affected and there’s still no permanent fix in sight,” said PIPSC President Debi Daviau. “Public servants never know what is next on the horizon when it comes to Phoenix. Our members deserve to know when its problems are going to be fixed once and for all.”

Some efforts are being made to improve the situation, such as the creation of an “Inter-Department Analysis Team” which will include representatives from various departments, the Treasury Board, vendors and unions. Improvements to the Call Centres are also welcome. But these efforts still fall short of the mark, as new problems with Phoenix continue to emerge. Most recently, issues with retroactive pay and the lack of pension and benefit statements for the year cast doubt on a quick fix.

“We recognize the government’s efforts to address these issues, but much more needs to be done to resolve these problems once and for all, and soon. Our public service was recently recognized as the best in the world. We need to keep it that way. A critical way to ensure it is to fix Phoenix,” concluded Daviau. 

The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada represents some 55,000 professionals across Canada’s federal and provincial public sectors.

Follow us on Facebook and on Twitter (@pipsc_ipfpc).

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For further information:

Pierre Villon
(613) 228-6310 ext 4928 (office)
or (613) 794-9369 (cell.)
pvillon@pipsc.ca

(*) Parade starts at Ottawa City Hall (Elgin and Lisgar) at noon and ends at McNabb Park (Gladstone and Bronson), where there will be activities, entertainment, food and more from 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Press Release

Ottawa, April 28, 2017 – Representatives from several public service unions reacted cautiously yesterday to the creation of a government working group to tackle the Phoenix pay system.

The “Working Group of Ministers on Achieving Steady State for the Pay System”, will be chaired by Ralph Goodale, Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness and comprises several cabinet ministers, including Finance, Treasury Board and Public Services.

Public Service Alliance of Canada President, Robyn Benson, said that “PSAC welcomes any announcement from the government aimed at fixing Phoenix. We appreciate that the government is finally taking these problems seriously, but we need to see some action.” She added that public service employees need a system that pays them accurately and on time. “We have yet to see a timeline for when that will happen.”

“This announcement is the result of constant lobbying by public service unions on behalf of their members,” added Debi Daviau, president of the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada. “In the last federal budget, the government failed to respond to our request to pledge $75 million to help fix Phoenix. While this is not new money, the $70 million per year for the next two years that they have now committed to Phoenix is welcome news. We will continue to make sure that they spend that money to fix the system.”

Union representatives will work closely with this ministerial working group on Phoenix and will remind the government that it must compensate affected employees for pain and suffering, and compensate them for loss of interest as a result of delayed pay.

According to André Picotte, acting president at the Canadian Association of Professional Employees, “the Phoenix fiasco is the result of plan that did not take the interests of the public service employees to heart.

For his part, Jason Godin, president of the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers – CSN said: “We want to be positive and believe that this new initiative to settle Phoenix will be the right one, but we remain cautious. We still have new cases that pop up every two weeks, so it's hard to be very enthusiastic at the moment”.

Finally, public service unions also demand that the government commit to three things: hire more staff with full access to Phoenix in order to respond to the requests made by employees; hire permanent, not temporary, staff at the call centres who have the training and support to help our members and; keep the satellite pay centres open until all problems with Phoenix have been resolved.

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The 18 bargaining agents of the federal public service employees are:

• Association of Canadian Financial Officers
• Association of Justice Counsel
• Canadian Air Traffic Control Association, Unifor Local 5454
• Canadian Association of Professional Employees
• Canadian Federal Pilots Association
• Canadian Merchant Service Guild
• Canadian Military Colleges Faculty Association
• Coast Guard Marine Communications Officers Unifor Local 2182
• Unifor, Local 87-M
• Federal Government Dockyard Chargehands Association
• Federal Government Dockyard Trades and Labour Council (East)
• Federal Government Dockyard Trades and Labour Council (West)
• International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 2228
• Professional Association of Foreign Service Officers
• Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada
• Public Service Alliance of Canada
• Research Council Employees' Association
• Union of Canadian Correctional Officers - CSN

For information:

Pierre Lebel, CAPE
plebel@acep-cape.ca
613-236-9181, ext 263 or 613-889-1027

Jonathan Choquette, PSAC
choquej@psac-afpc.com
819-773-2511

Johanne Fillion, PIPSC
jfillion@pipsc.ca
613-228-6310, ext 4953 or 613-883-4900

Katerine Desgroseilliers, CSN
Katerine.Desgroseilliers@csn.qc.ca
514-598-2163 or 514-265-4250

For Immediate release

OTTAWA, April 27, 2017 - The announcement today that the federal government will reallocate $140 million over two years to ensure federal employees affected by the Phoenix payroll system are properly paid is a welcome, if long overdue, commitment to fix Phoenix once and for all, says the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada (PIPSC).

"We advocated for a special $75 million reserve fund in the current budget, so this shows the government is finally taking the severity of our members' concerns seriously," said PIPSC President Debi Daviau.

"We're also gratified to see that the government has agreed to reimburse charges for tax advisory services incurred by members due to Phoenix problems. This, after all, is only fair," Daviau added.

"It remains to be seen, however, how effective the government will be in controlling payroll errors in the future,” she added. “We’ve argued for a long time that overreliance on outsourced services – including introduction of the Phoenix payroll software and continued reliance on IBM – programs government functions to fail. We hope the ministerial working group also announced today takes these concerns seriously.”

PIPSC represents some 55,000 public-sector professionals across the country, most of them employed by the federal government.

Follow us on Facebook and on Twitter (@pipsc_ipfpc)

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For further information:

Johanne Fillion (613) 228-6310 ext 2303 (office) or (613) 883-4900 (cell.), jfillion@pipsc.ca.